Call It Quits, Andy Rooney!

By Alan Caruba

One of the great mysteries of television is why someone at CBS hasn’t sat down with Andy Rooney and told him to clean out his desk. He is, after all, an irrelevant old man who shows up at the end of every edition of “Sixty Minutes” to rant about things of no significance whatever.

Now, I am old, too, but at least I try to pay attention to what is actually happening in the world and provide some kind of comment that might prove helpful. Rooney spent his few minutes of fame blathering about news stories and their headlines that didn’t interest him. That’s right, he talked about things he didn’t care about.

I don’t normally watch “Sixty Minutes.” I had the show on as background “white noise” because I was reading a book and the baby in the apartment next to mind was wailing away as only babies can do. The phone rang and I had the pleasure of chatting with one of the most brilliant minds in America, a resident of Falcon, Missouri, who finds the current political scene too joyful for words as Hillary and Bill Clinton finally use up whatever little credibility they ever had.

As I hung up the phone, there was the craggy visage of Andy Rooney, leaning forward and snarling at the TV camera, i.e., the viewers, to pass a few minutes asking inane questions such as what platinum is used for. That question was occasioned by the fact that its price, along with gold and other minerals, is going through the roof. So, Andy, it must be used for something! You could Google the answer.

Hear my plea, CBS-TV! Designate some intern to hand Rooney his walking papers. He stopped being entertaining or informative sometime shortly after Watergate. Nobody that dense should be allowed on television.